Becker's Hospital Review

13 CFO / FINANCE Lawsuit, arrest, jail: How one city in Kansas handles medical debt scofflaws By Kelly Gooch A ProPublica report sheds light on people in the U.S. who end up arrested and jailed because they owe medical debt and don't show up in court. While this happens across the country, the nonprofit newsroom spotlights Coffeyville, Kan. ProPublica reporter Lizzie Presser, who talked to patients and interviewed those who had filed law- suits against them, found more than 30 arrest warrants issued against people in Coffeyville over medical debt, and at least 11 people had been jailed in the last year. Patients who are sued there by the local hospital, physicians, or an ambulance service over medical debt and summoned to court can be arrested and jailed if they don't come to court and face their debt collector, according to ProPublica. The website reported that one debt collector asked defendants with unpaid medical bills to list what they earned and owned as the collector weighed options such as setting up a payment plan or garnishing wages. If people with medical debt don't show up to this "debtor's exam," they may be cited for contempt of court, and if a hearing on contempt is missed, the debt collector can ask the judge to issue a warrant to arrest the debtor. If a debtor is arrested and posts bail, a collector working on com- mission gets part of the bail money, the website reported. n FTC orders major payers, 2 health systems to turn over data for merger study By Alia Paavola T he Federal Trade Commission has or- dered five major health insurers and two hos- pital systems to hand over various cost and claims data to help the agency study the effects of hospital mergers. The insurers — Aetna, Anthem, BlueCross BlueSh- ield of Tennessee, Cigna and UnitedHealthcare — were asked to provide claims data. The health systems, Johnson City, Tenn.-based Bal- lad Health and Cabell Huntington (W.Va.) Hospital, were asked to provide patient billing, discharge and salary data. The FTC intends to use the data to study govern- ment-sanctioned hospital mergers, called "certifi- cates of public advantage." Certificates of public advantage are regulato- ry policies that some states use as a workaround to approve mergers while avoiding federal antitrust scrutiny. Ballad Health and Cabell Huntington Hospital were asked to turn over information because certificates of public advantage were approved and used to se- cure their mergers. n Erlanger posts $4M loss in Q1 of FY 2020: 7 things to know By Kelly Gooch C hattanooga, Tenn.-based Erlanger Health System lost $2 million more than it anticipated in the first quarter of fiscal year 2020, CFO Britt Tabor report- ed, according to a health system email to Becker's Hospital Review. Seven things to know: 1. Erlanger, a seven-hospital health system, posted a net loss of $4.4 million in the first quarter that began July 1, compared to a $2.4 million budgeted loss. 2. e net loss came as Erlanger posted net patient revenue of $263.8 million in the first quarter of fiscal year 2020, compared to a budgeted $270.9 million. 3. Erlanger attributed the lower than expected revenue to lower than expected patient volume. 4. In the first three months of the fiscal year, regional transfers declined, emergency room inpatient conversion rate shied and com- mercial discharges were lower than expect- ed, according to Erlanger. 5. e health system said outpatient surgeries and births also went over budget and prior year numbers. 6. Despite the $4.4 million net loss, an in- dependent auditor reported that the health system has seen 38.6 percent patient volume growth in the last five years, Erlanger said. e health system expects to see patient vol- ume growth continue in fiscal year 2020, but not as fast as projected in the year prior. 7. Amid the financial difficulties, Erlanger an- nounced Oct. 21 that it had eliminated or re- structured 30 management positions. n

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